Community....

So many people have written about community.  Our church talks about being in community.  My team leader is committed to community.  My growth group is completely about community.  IF exists to equip women in community.  I used to want to isolate a whole lot more.  I've learned I am an introvert and what introverts need to be healthy. An important part, oddly enough, is community.  There is also an element of space that we need, and we certainly don't need shallow social gatherings.  If we haven't had too much interaction, we would gladly go to a gathering where community might happen. 

When I say community, I don't mean my neighborhood - though I do feel a bit challenged to include my neighbors in my community.  I just looked the word up at dictionary.com and I don't think we're using the correct word.  Or perhaps, we are redefining what it means.  Actually, if we look at the definition of the verb commune, this is what we are talking about more precisely.  Communality is a better word but not something people can relate to. The noun commune has developed a negative reputation though it is rather close to what we are talking about. 

When I say I want to be in community, I mean I want to commune.  Dictionary.com defines it this way.

Commune:

"to converse or talk together, usually with profound intensity, intimacy, etc.;

interchange thoughts or feelings

to be in intimate communication or rapport"

This kind of activity leads to what I'm talking about when I say community.  We have these interchanges and then we walk through life together.  Masks are taken off.  Hard truths are spoken.  Joys are shared. Burdens are carried together.  The intimate rapport leads us to pray for one another and take care of each other's children and bring a meal.  We are not talking about a club or a controlling small group, though both of these have developed from what was meant to be good. 

Fears are faced. And conquered.  We cry with each other and we cheer each other.  We don't try to be each other.  We celebrate little steps so we can take more.  We diffuse lies for each other - the lies of others and the lies in our own heads that play on repeat.  We want our safe space, but we want others to experience this community too, so we encourage others to gather with one another.

It's like family really.  A safe place to share the struggle and be challenged and affirmed to go out and face the world around us.  I completely realize that this is a gift and it comes along much too infrequently.  When I look around, I think more people want this but we are too afraid. 

I was too afraid.  I didn't trust.  I still don't trust easily.  However, I have grown just enough to know that God is the anchor of my life and not the people I may be trusting or not.  They might all fail me.  Some have.  (and I recall that I have failed others as well)  My life and hope is wrapped up in Jesus and while I still fight fear and hold my cards rather close, I am more willing than I used to be not to hide. 

We think we are protecting ourselves when we hide, but it is more likely we are buying a lie.  We are protecting others and protecting our reputations.  "Love covers a multitude of sins."  Remember that?  It is truth, but there can also be twisted isolation born from the phrase.  Life is such a balancing act.  Tempted to slander because we are hurt.  Tempted to isolate because we don't want to slander.  Tempted to pretend it doesn't hurt so we don't isolate.  Mask up and at the ready.  This is not conducive to communing. 

Then there is the other side.  In the name of authenticity, there are those who never cease to talk about their pain and continually point out blame while they frame their words piously but never move forward nor show any true desire to do so.  They do not ask us to walk with them through the valley sharing the load, but to carry them through it.  When they fail to make progress, we are tempted take on blame that is not ours and they may even assign it to us.  We can and are commanded to bear burdens for one another, but we cannot carry anyone.  God alone is able to do that.  This scenario can cause us to doubt the value of communing. 

Community, in this real sense, is worth the battle that accompanies it.  Our enemy desire to separate and isolate and destroy us.  God desires for us to commune - first with Him and then with other who follow Him, showing the world what love is and the difference Jesus makes in our lives.

I have been sick for about a week now and I have missed many of my intentional community gatherings.  While I am disappointed, I still know it is there because it is something I have cultivated and I will continue to do so.  Are you?